Conventional photographic cameras are designed to accept unexposed film which has been enclosed in a light shielding cartridge or other light shielding wrapper, to facilitate loading and unloading the camera without exposing the film. Many consumers find such cartridges or wrapped film to be difficult to load into or unload from a camera. The costs of such a cartridge or other wrapper and associated commercial packaging are significant components of the cost to the ultimate consumer. In addition, this known practice requires a film manufacturer to maintain an inventory of cartridges or rolls of film with various pre-selected lengths of film.
In recent years, so-called single use or disposable cameras have become popular, such as those disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,890,130 and 5,235,366. While such cameras do not require the consumer to load or unload the film, the costs to the manufacturer continue to be high for disassembling such cameras to remove a factory-installed film cartridge and recover reusable parts. And, an inventory of cameras with various lengths of film still must be maintained.
Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. application Ser. No. 08/370,592 discloses a unique type of camera which can be loaded with a discrete length of unexposed film of a length selected by the consumer and subsequently unloaded of a discrete length of exposed film. A need has become apparent for apparatus and methods for quickly and economically loading and unloading such a unique camera. More specifically, a need has arisen for an apparatus for opening and closing a slidable closure on such a unique camera, to permit loading or unloading of a discrete film strip.